Vice President Joe Biden is hinting that the White House’s pick for a successor to Justice Antonin Scalia could be someone with bipartisan support.
“The Senate gets to have a say, and so in order to get this done the president is not going to be able to go out, nor would it be his instinct anyway, to pick the most liberal jurist in the nation and put them on the court,” Biden told Minnesota Public Radio in an interview aired Thursday. “There are plenty of judges on high courts already who have had unanimous support of the Republicans.”
Some Republicans have argued President Obama shouldn’t pick a new justice to replace Scalia, who died unexpectedly over the weekend, until after a new president takes the office in January 2017.
“To leave the seat vacant at this critical moment in American history is a little bit like saying, ‘God forbid something happen to the president and the vice president, we’re not going to fill the presidency for another year and a half,'” Biden said.
Despite Biden’s remarks, Obama made it clear on Tuesday that he doesn’t necessarily have to pick a moderate judge. When asked directly if he might be pondering a moderate, Obama quickly interrupted, and said “No, I don’t know where you found that.”
Obama has directed his staff to start selecting a replacement for Scalia, the White House said Monday, though there won’t be an announcement on the nomination before the Senate returns Feb. 22.
